Reply to XY, Part 1

I think that “liberalism” is a very loaded word with many different meanings. You can a political liberal in the Lockean sense, and disagree with economic liberalism. I have charged that you are a positive liberal and I think rightly so. In your arguments, it seems that negative freedom- the government’s main job is to ensure that one man’s freedom is not infringed by another’s- is not enough. For you, the government has to step in and intervene in people’s life and make sure that they don’t screw up their own lives.

I agree with you that the first step to a completely liberated model of organ market is the “fudged-over” intermediate model of Iran. You used the word “intermediate” and seem to have tacitly conceded the point that there should a natural progression to the end stage of a fully-fledged regulated organ market J

I will respond to your rebuttals point by point.

Coercion. XY has fell flat on his rhetorical question by asking how I would feel if organ dealers try to bug me like insurance and property agents. I would feel dulan and just throw away the brochures and not pick up the call. And I dare say that this would be the common response of most people. XY, you are too nice la.

In any case, I think XY has a very strange conception of coercion and how the regulated organ market is to work. By coercion, I mean that an individual is forced to do something against his free will. The organ dealer pointing a gun to my head and asking me to dig out my kidney is coercion, listening to his irritating phone call is not. In any case, the harassed individual can appeal to existing laws to protect him from nuisance calls. I reiterate that the regulated organ market is merely a mechanism for interested buyer and seller of organ to engage in VOLUNTARY transactions. XY, you have not demonstrated to me as to why an individual is “coerced” to sell his organ. I don’t remember reading any article on individuals being coerced to give up their sperm or eggs. It would especially be hard for guys to be coerced to give up their sperm J

Safety. A regulated market is definitely safer than a black market. That is one of the most important reasons as to why the Dutch government legalized prostitution. Logically it makes common sense. In a regulated market, you have regular spot checks and operators are subjected to license renewals only after they comply with certain standards. Even if they are ineffective, they are better than no standards.

Yes, you may have black markets coexisting with legal ones but they are likely to be very small. The whole point of having open legal market is that it reduces incentives for both sellers and buyers in the black market. Take for instance marijuana. If marijuana is legalized, buyers of marijuana would have very little incentive to buy from the black market because they run the risks of paying heavy penalties by buying from an unauthorized seller and they cannot be certain of its quality. More importantly, marijuana sellers have little incentives to continue operations in the black market. The whole point of operating in a black market is to earn supernormal profits, which will be eroded in the event that marijuana is legalized. Together with the heavy penalties of getting caught, marijuana sellers would withdraw from the black market. I see the same happening for the organ market.

I think there is something wrong with the reasoning you used in the construction industry. The occasional safety lapses are not strong evidence against regulated markets. In fact, more often than not, the problem is not with regulation, but rather the lack of regulation. You used the construction industry to illustrate your point; I will use the coal industry, a similarly heavy industry where safety standards are important to illustrate my point. Why is it that so many people die in China’s coal mines rather than those in France or the United States? It is because the regulatory authority is messed up in China and cannot be bothered to enforce safety standards. All the coal mines operators in China, France and the United States are concerned with maximizing profits. The crux of the problem is the lack of regulation rather than the profit motive per se. I will change my opinion if you can demonstrate to me that a black market is safer than a regulated market.

Happiness. I concede to you that happiness is very subjective and no one (including me especially) acting under limited information can be certain that a chosen path will lead to happiness. Yet, there is at least a 17% success rate, which is better than no hope of success right? Out of 100 people, 17 people have the chance to happy… the other 83 are already unhappy anyway, it seems pretty good to me.

Moreover, you highlighted the problem of unhappy children, tensions between surrogate and biological parents etc. I think these are information on uncertainty known before the willing parties take part in the transaction. I don’t think we have the right to judge them being worse off simply because some problems surface from time to time. I have watched the Winter Sonata show, lovers turn out to be brother/sister, forbidden love and all sorts of other human relations shit. I feel sorry for them la, but hey, these stuff are too rare to cloud my rational decision making J

The good thing about organ trading is that there are fewer externalities. Organ trading primarily involves the buyer and the seller. Organ trading does not pop out children of angst. The negative externality of a child confused about his parentage will not pop out from organ trading.

I have conceded that happiness is subjective and that even if we debate to the death, we cannot tell whether an organ transplant will make the recipient happier. So XY, as true political liberal, why not let the recipient be his own judge and bear both the good fruits and negative consequences of his freedom of action?